THE GREATER MIAMI OPERA'S 'CARMEN' AN ONSTAGE ARENA FULL OF CHORUS MEMBERS WITNESSES A TOUGH -- AT TIMES VICIOUS -- CARMEN IN THIS UNIQUE, INTENSIFIED PRODUCTION.

With those bold words of self-description, Carmen rejects the last-ditch pleas of her former lover, Don Jose. She will not resume their affair, even if it means death at his hands. And that is precisely what it means.

Thus, one of opera's most alluring women meets her fate. Of course, she doesn't really die. Her character merely dissipates into the rarefied realm of mythology, where Don Giovanni, Faust and other definition-defying types reside. She coolly waits to be re-substantiated the next time a company wants to present the perennially popular opera.

This, at least, is how Bernard Uzan sees it. He is the stage director, and also one of the set designers, for the Greater Miami Opera's production of Bizet's Carmen, which opens Monday.

"Faust, Don Giovanni, and Carmen are the three most difficult operas to stage," Uzan said. "They deal with myths. Everyone sees (the title characters) in their own way; everyone has his own interpretation. That makes them bigger than what we are.

"You can ask people who is Madama Butterfly, who is Mimi? And they will, with very little difficulty, describe the person. But Carmen is a million possibilities of what a woman can be. That's how she becomes bigger than humanity. Nobody can really explain her."

The French director's attempt at an explanation will come in what promises to be an eye-opening manner. Miami audiences will not see the expected, quaint settings of the first three acts. Instead, the inspiration for this production, which will be presented at L'Opera de Montreal next year, comes from something audiences usually never see in the fourth act.

That finale, as originally conceived, takes place outside a bullring. In this version, which Uzan developed with co-designer Michel Beaulac, the focus shifts to inside the bullring -- and not just for the last act.

Throughout the performance, an arena will frame the stage. The chorus will be sitting in the ring seats, but they will not be watching combat between man and beast. Instead, the opera will be played out before them.

"In a way, having the chorus there will be like a Greek tragedy," Uzan said. "And that brings in what I call the notion of witness. If I fight with my wife, and there is no one else present, it might last five minutes, and then it's over. But if I fight with her in front of her mother, it can go on for two hours. Having a witness makes it more intense.

"In this production, the chorus will react to the big moments, but supers (supernumeraries) will do most of the acting onstage that the chorus would normally do. In Act 4, the chorus disappears, because at that moment, we don't need a witness."

Uzan will use illustrations by Goya, projected onto a scrim, to fill in visual details as needed. The director hopes that this nontraditional design will shed fresh light on an opera many people take for granted.

"What I am trying to do is go for what is most important -- the confrontation between the characters, the drama and tragedy of these people.

"And I wanted to go away from all the cliches of Spain -- always the hand on the hip. Of course, if you have to show a woman seducing a man, you must have some rolling of the hips."

In addition to stripping away picturesque trappings, the director wants to avoid other things that obscure what he considers the real Carmen.

"I wanted to go back to what was really written, and not repeat the mistakes that have been handed down from production to production. In the first act, for example, in most stagings, a bell goes ding-ding, girls come out of the factory and into the square. Carmen always comes out last.

"If you read the original dialogue, you find out that bell announces that work will resume after lunch. The girls are supposed to be returning to work. So what is Carmen doing coming out last -- is she working overtime in the factory? No, she is the last one to go to work. Productions are full of mistakes like this."

Uzan also tried to clear up odd moments, such as the opening scene, when soldiers comment on how strange the people in the square look -- but don't say why.

Uzan's discovered that it is supposed to be April when the opera opens, a month when a religious procession always took place in Seville. The marchers included men in the eerie hooded garb of the Spanish Inquisition. One of the Goya drawings Uzan found for his projections illustrates this "strange" costume.

"The famous parade at the end is another example," the director said. "It's ridiculous. The parade is always after the bullfight, not before. But people like it because a parade looks grand -- and this is supposed to be a grand opera."

One inauthentic aspect of Carmen is being retained in the Miami production. These days, most companies present at least an approximation of Bizet's original score, which had spoken dialogue in between the music, instead of recitatives (composed after Bizet's death by Ernest Guiraud).

"That would have involved a mish-mash of accents," Uzan said. "I did a production like that once and I couldn't understand a word of it."

A STREAK OF VIOLENCE

With all of the cliche-cleansing, and with the spotlight more tightly focused on the central character, what new insights can audiences expect?

"She is not the usual, 'Aren't I sexy?' creature," Adria Firestone said. The mezzo-soprano has sung the role nearly 70 times, from New York to Australia, and is known for a traditional approach to the character.

"This Carmen is a harder, tougher woman. It's a very different, very powerful approach. This production makes me nervous. I'm scared, but it's also very exciting. It feels like the first time I'm really doing Carmen."

It's certainly the first time Firestone portrayed such a vicious Carmen. When Zuniga, the military officer, inopportunely returns to the smuggler's tavern, Carmen reacts with more than just the mocking tone called for in the score.

"As I sing Bel officier, bel officier," Firestone said, "I rip his shirt open, one button at a time. Then one slice, two slices, three slices with the knife. I'm carving him up and threatening him. At the end, when we are all singing about La liberte, Zuniga is dragged back in and executed.

"Jose tries to turn away, but I force him to watch; that seals his fate. When Carmen says to him, 'You're an accomplice; there's no escape; are you with us now?', it gives a very different sense of who she is."

NOT JUST A VIXEN

This violent incident is not the only new twist in Uzan's vision of the opera. Usually, when Carmen sings the Habanera, the style is strictly sultry as the singer pours on the Spanish vixen bit. Not this time. This Carmen won't even be wearing "the usual peasant blouse with one shoulder down" that Firestone usually does.

"I am totally still when I sing it. When we started to rehearse it, Bernard said, 'Sing it with sadness.' I said, 'With sadness?' But he wanted me to concentrate on the words -- it will never work out between men and women; the one you want ignores you, the one you don't want is the one who makes a play for you."

Another change from the norm will occur in the card scene, when Carmen's death is foretold.

"Bernard said, 'I don't want to see any fear in your face at all.' This Carmen knows that's the way it is, this is going to happen and she's not going to wiggle out of it. It's really the only moment in the opera when she is expressionless. It's not fear that does this, but certitude."

This Carmen does have a tender side, though. Firestone inadvertently revealed it during an intense rehearsal session.

"It was when I said 'no' to Don Jose in the last act. My eyes suddenly filled up with tears, I was so moved by what was going on. I had to turn away. It felt funny for her to feel this softness. But Bernard said, 'Keep it. This shows she is not a one-note bitch.' It's not that she has changed, but that she is a human being with a heart, after all. Otherwise, why would anyone be so interested in her?"

Uzan expects people onstage and in the theater to be interested in this Carmen, no matter how new she may seem to them.

"I never do anything that goes against the music or the words," Uzan said. "I just want to put a different emphasis on things. I think -- I hope -- it will be successful, with all the garbage off, all the tra-la-la's. A Carmen that is just tra-la-la's can be horrible."

PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

The Greater Miami Opera's production of Bizet's Carmen will be presented with Adria Firestone and Antonio Barasorda at 8 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Saturday; with Emily Golden and Richard Di Renzi at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, 8 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. April 25. Willie Anthony Waters is the conductor. All performances are at Dade County Auditorium. Limited ticket availability. Call 1-800-741-1010.